Today I got the pipe and brackets that Mike made up added to the front of the Pexto Shear. The top of the pipe is set up the same height as the surface of the shear, so no interference in using the shear. The pipe is 49" long so it can be used for a full sheet if we have enough oomph to bend it. Here the finished product: Sometimes you get lucky, here's the radius from our 4" pipe as matched to our seat back... Also made up some patch panels for my brother in law's El Camino. He brought some parts over that he had cut out, so we fabbed up some new parts, here's a sample...
I'm really not following what you're doing behind the back seat. Are you creating a storage compartment?
More back seat work on the 55. Mike is trimming up our brackets to give us a bit more clearance around the wheel wells so the upholstery can wrap around our panel... ....and I worked on taking some patterns of the rear corners... Transferred the pattern to some 18 gauge cold rolled steel and started some shrinking on the Baileigh power hammer.. Test fit.... Bottom edge gets hemmed so the upholstery cloth has less chance of cuts... A bit more cleanup work, but I'm real pleased with how this is turning out.. .
More work on the seat back, a test bend to see how well it matches our corner.... Then to bend the radius on a piece of 19 gauge for the full width... Then to bend down a flange to "hook" the frame.... The metal is thinned at the bend line using a tipping die to give us a more crisp bend... Bent at 90* in the magnetic brake.. Next we slotted the panel for our 10" bass speaker. This should let out the sound but still support our upholstery material for a more subtle look.. Then the bottom flange is also thinned at the bend and bent on the magnetic brake.. .....and our test fit into the car...
Nice fab work on the sub enclosure, but unfortunately it's a disaster acoustically. One, it's not sealed (the seat back won't 'seal' it). As you go lower in frequency, the importance of a sealed enclosure goes up. If you want any kind of decent sub performance (particularly with a relatively small 10"), it's critical. And generally speaking, the larger the enclosure, the better. You can vent them, but there's a set of calculations needed that will describe the enclosure size and size and location of any vents. Two, if the speaker is attached to that sheetmetal, it's very likely to resonate.... badly. Even if it's not directly attached, that's still a large possibility. Large, dead-flat pieces of sheetmetal are about the last thing you want as an acoustic 'surface' with any speaker. You could roll stiffening beads into it to increase it's rigidity, but that will only help to a point (as well as complicating the upholstery). I'll make two recommendations; one, spray the inside of the sheetmetal with at least two heavy coats of rubberized sound deadener. You want this as acoustically 'dead' as possible. Sound mat won't do the job here. Two, use a stand-alone sub enclosure built from 3/4" medium-density particle board (there's a reason this is almost always used for sub enclosures). Have the speaker opening line up with your 'grill', just don't attach the enclosure to the sheetmetal. Fastening to the floor (with a chunk of carpet between to insulate it) would be better. If that was the plan, I'll shut up now....
Thanks for the comments guys! Steve, appreciate the input. The subwoofer the owner purchased is for surface mount only, I guess they want that free advertising. As with most of the other details and modifications we have made thus far, less is more, hidden is better. We have strived to keep all the changes subtle enough that we leave people scratching their head trying to figure out what is different. Where this enclosure deviates from that thinking, the wagon in it's bare form leaves little for space to accommodate these modern creature comforts without the risk of tire spray, so the seat enclosure it is. We do plan on upholstery cloth directly over the slots to help conceal the speaker but still allow some sound to permeate. In order to "hide" the speaker behind the panel, we are using an offset panel that screws to the backside of the center two uprights of the framework, aligned to the hole as you suggested. I could use rubber grommets on the screw holes for additional isolation, if needed. For an MDF enclosure, this could well be attached to the outer sides of those same uprights. Personally I tried to talk the owner into no stereo at all. A stroker motor with 40 series flowmasters is music enough. If you don't like the station, roll down the window.
With a stout motor and flowmasters you probably won't be able to hear a sterio at all. Love the punched pattern, very slick. Is that a new bottom tool holder on the Lennox?
OJ, the lower tool holder in this photo is the original to the machine... The dies and "stripper" foot on the punching operation were all fabricated for this job..
Well last night found us carpenterin.... using some 3/4 MDF and some construction adhesive... The amp will get mounted on the access cover.
Robert, that looks like the plan. I think I'd still spray some sound deadener on the inside of the flat metal panel with the speaker grill to prevent any resonance vibration.
Steve, thanks for the input. The plan at this point is to finish the corner for the passenger side, weld corners to the center sheet metal wrap, and paint this separate from the framework. Then, during assembly I'm contemplating a strip of body side molding adhesive on the frame uprights and then install the sheet metal to those, thinking it would help isolate the sheet metal from the frame for less vibration possibilities...
Got the drivers corner for the rear seat back tig welded in place and flange folded. Now for the passenger side. On a side note, officially gave Photobucket the boot as my subscription expired last Friday. Robert isn't paying their extortion fees. Surprised the pictures are still showing...
Still haven't set up the new photo hosting, so todays update via youtube. Got the passenger corner all formed up and Tig welded in place for the rear seat back enclosure..
You don't need no stinking photo host Just look at the bottom of your post and hit the upload a file button find your photo/photos and put it or them directly on the HAMB.
Looks good Robert! Thanks for showing all the steps and progress. The seat and enclosure looks 'simple' as you show it here. I find it incredible to see the amount of time and skill it takes to develop and idea to this point of completion! Keep it up and thanks for sharing
Great work Robert! I have a concern that I want to make you aware of. I have been rear-ended in my truck that had a subwoofer box behind the seat. As my body compressed the seat spring during the crash the top edge of the subwoofer did not compress and it hurt my back. Could a vertical strip of metal be added to the top seat support to take the sharp edge of the wood subwoofer away, something that will spread the impact force out and not focused on the fine line of the top of the box. Anyway I hope this helps for what its worth. Greg
Greg, we have some 5/16 bolts going through the box into some riv-nuts in the floor subframe. Hope those will hold. Well I think I have google images figured out now, so lets try an update on the wagon. With the back seat rear enclosure and it's frame both sprayed in epoxy, time to assemble the two together. I didn't want to use hardware/rivets on the skin as I thought it would stay flatter under the upholstery without. Also, with the amp and bass speaker inside the enclosure, we needed something to limit vibration of the adjacent pieces. Our choice is to use some body molding adhesive tape to join the two together. The tape is applied to the frame, and then the skin attached on top of that.. Next, we need to work on our console and the shifter inside of it. We have the console that came with the 2002 Monte Carlo interior, but it has far too much plastic that it didn't belong. In looking at other options, we decided on the horse shoe shifter used on the Chevelle. In conducting a test fit of the cable, we found it's trajectory path was much too straight where it either lifted the front of the shifter, or pulled the bulkhead fitting out of the "tunnel" mockup. Shifter lift: Our solution was to raise the cable exit from the shifter housing higher in order to have a better arc of the cable for entry through the floor. Here a "relocation bracket" has been added: Bracket all welded in place, looks like this will work for our shifter, return policy officially void now, but cable path fits much better through the floor: We also needed to finalize seat belts for the rear seats. These are 12 gauge CRS pieces that are plug welded to the floor pan, 1/2" diameter bolt holding the anchor points for inner seat belts. The outer belts needed to be all the way out to the wheel well, and to better "anchor" we made similar 12 ga brackets, this one with a hemmed end to "hook" the pinch weld seam of the floor pan/wheel well, then plug welded in place to the wheel well. Again, a 1/2" bolt will anchor the seat belt: While Mike and Jake started the layout of the console......... ......I fabbed up some bucket seat brackets out of 16 ga CRS for a 37 Ford. These had to be 3" high and only 1-1/2" wide, which was too high for my gooseneck die in the press brake. Chose to make them in two pieces and fusion tacked together using the TIG.
Thanks! Console fabrication, bottom and under dash edges are hemmed, folded flanges will support the filler panel between each side.. Fitting up the corner radius
Some sprayouts done this evening to see if we can nail down a color for the green. Will take another video tomorrow in the Sunlight for the true test. Color 1: Corvette Limerock Green Color 2: Land Rover Kosrae Green Color 3: Audi Azores Green Color 4: H/K Organic Green Kandy Basecoat
Sunlight views in same order, Color 1: Corvette Limerock Green Color 2: Land Rover Kosrae Green Color 3: Audi Azores Green Color 4: H/K Organic Green Kandy Basecoat Didn't get the pictures in overcast, but these help to show, 1-3 don't show color well at all in overcast or dim/indirect light conditions. As we'd like the car to look green regardless, we're leaning toward the H/K
Doing some organizing in the shop, getting ready for the metalshaping class. Saturday we made a rack for the Hoosier Profiles anvils for the wheeling machine. Used 2 x 4 x 1/8" aluminum angle and Tig welded on round stock. Go kart slick mounts on the back side. Also picked out a spot on the bench for mounting the new arbor press..
We got the wagon parts pulled out of the booth this past weekend where we had them stored during the metalshaping class. Getting back to tying up some loose ends.. Mike cuts out the driver side of the console.. All ready for thinning the bend lines.. .....while Jake and I worked on tipping the edge on the second seat bolster..
Been in Florida the past couple weeks for the day job, got back in time for Saturday's shop day. Jake worked on the rear seat bolster, the top profile was traced from the one we made for the driver's side but this mark needs to be on the opposite side for us to tip the flange. Easy transfer is to use a punch on the line to transfer the mark's location through the panel and then trace.. ....and then he used various round anvils for hammer forming the corners. I got started on welding in the corners of the passenger console side... This might work yet... While Jake was tipping flanges he needed some stretch in the crowned area. Looking at the too many pieces that came out of the Erco, it's possible that Jake has too much kick. We made some new spring plates out of 1/16 stainless sheet.. Back in business...
This weekend's progress... Jake finishing up on the seat bolsters. We don't always have the right tools to use, so on occasion we make them. This corner of the panel needed a sharper shape on the anvil With both bolsters done and fitted to the rear seat, Jake media blasted both and hung them up in the booth where he applied some SPI Epoxy primer. Meanwhile Mike and I worked on getting the driver's side of the console folded up.. We started by using the tipping die in the Lennox for thinning the bend lines. This both gives a sharper bend and also gives a "feel" for when the press brake's upper die is located in the proper bend location. Here's the highly technical back stop used to set the fold distance. We have a growing collection of these starting as the dimensional requirements change.. With two sides now, a spacer was made to clamp in the middle to hold our proper width.. Seats above are all the way forward, compare front location to next picture where they have been moved back to normal location, as well as mocking up the Chevelle shifter.. Next we'll get the radius pieces added and start on the internal structures of the console.
Maybe I missed it way back but what type of shop do you consider yours? Like general metal fabrication, restoration, or Hot Rod building.
The Jalopy Journal
